Technical Guide for D800/D800E

I found this Technical Guide from Nikon very interesting indeed.
[link=http://www.nikonusa.com/en_US/o/Y6wrkA9OU_z04IreazIXl_22UII/PDF/D800_TechnicalGuide_En.pdf]http://www.nikonusa.com/en_US/o/Y6wrkA9OU_z04IreazIXl_22UII/PDF/D800_TechnicalGuide_En.pdf[/link]
One thing that I had not thought of - the Guide recommend the use of Live view for some subjects, on the basis that, with 36Mp on the sensor, the slap of the mirror can cause much more blur than with lessor resolutions.

One thing that I had not thought of - the Guide recommend the use of Live view for some subjects, on the basis that, with 36Mp on the sensor, the slap of the mirror can cause much more blur than with lessor resolutions.

I just like to think that some people at Nikon HQ were reading a thread on here and decided they had better put out a document to show that that Strawman chap was correct :D
I think it is a good and fair article and its important they get it out before a pile of people get the camera and start complaining because it will take good photo's but if you want the best resolution then people are going to have to be very careful about how they set it up and use it. So more care in focus, greater thought on depth of field, and greater stability or higher shutter speeds.
I think if you use it and if you print out at A3 size your number of good shots will stay the same as say a D700. But if you intend to heavily crop the image or print out larger then the task will get a lot harder.
Which brings us back to how many pixels do you need? Sounds like Nikon have quite a few D700 still to sell, and for some people it may turn out to be just as good.

I just like to think that some people at Nikon HQ were reading a thread on here and decided they had better put out a document to show that that Strawman chap was correct

I think it is a good and fair article and its important they get it out before a pile of people get the camera and start complaining because it will take good photo's but if you want the best resolution then people are going to have to be very careful about how they set it up and use it. So more care in focus, greater thought on depth of field, and greater stability or higher shutter speeds.

I think if you use it and if you print out at A3 size your number of good shots will stay the same as say a D700. But if you intend to heavily crop the image or print out larger then the task will get a lot harder.

Which brings us back to how many pixels do you need? Sounds like Nikon have quite a few D700 still to sell, and for some people it may turn out to be just as good.

I think Nikon do, indeed, recognise what you say, Strawman. Their latest sitrep states that they intend to continue manufacturing the D700 alongside the D800.
When I do a reality check, I have to acknowledge that the 12Mp on the D3s was enough for virtually all my needs. But the prospect of 36Mp does open up new possibilities that may, or may not, turn out to be quite interesting.
For example, cropping telephoto shots quite severely to get extra reach from my lenses or shooting with a ultra-W/A lens and top and bottom slicing to create "stitchless" panoramas.
At the end of the day, a 36Mp sensor will provide much more data than a 12Mp sensor - but the caveat is, of course, that it has to be good data.
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I think Nikon do, indeed, recognise what you say, Strawman. Their latest sitrep states that they intend to continue manufacturing the D700 alongside the D800.

When I do a reality check, I have to acknowledge that the 12Mp on the D3s was enough for virtually all my needs. But the prospect of 36Mp does open up new possibilities that may, or may not, turn out to be quite interesting.

For example, cropping telephoto shots quite severely to get extra reach from my lenses or shooting with a ultra-W/A lens and top and bottom slicing to create "stitchless" panoramas.

At the end of the day, a 36Mp sensor will provide much more data than a 12Mp sensor - but the caveat is, of course, that it has to be good data.

Interesting reading to someone like me who is upgrading from my D3100. I still can't make my mind up which way to go, the D700 or the D800. I'm not bothered about video capability and what worries me is, if I go for the D800 will I also have to upgrade my poor old computer for processing. I like shooting landscapes and I think I will settle on the 24-120 f4 lens. But with which body ???
Martin

Interesting reading to someone like me who is upgrading from my D3100. I still can't make my mind up which way to go, the D700 or the D800. I'm not bothered about video capability and what worries me is, if I go for the D800 will I also have to upgrade my poor old computer for processing. I like shooting landscapes and I think I will settle on the 24-120 f4 lens. But with which body ???

For serious landscapes, the D800 over the D700 every time. It is one of the (maybe few) genres where the very high resolution will be a decided benefit and the relatively poor (in today's terms) performance at ultra-high ISO is not an issue. (In fact, ISO for ISO, the D800 may well outperform the D700 but we will have to wait for more detailed testing). Nor is the lack of a very high frame rate an issue for landscapes.
As you will have noted in the Technical Guide, your best landscapes are going to be taken using a tripod and with an aperture not much smaller than f/11.
The lens you mention might be a good compromise for starters. The Nikkor lenses I use for landscapes are (in order of frequency of use), the 24-70mm f/2.8, the 70-200mm f/2.8 and the 16-35mm f/4. I have just sold my D3s and placed an order for a D800, which seems right as most of my photography tends to be landscape and wildlife. But it would not have been the right move if I was heavily into sport and event photography. Horses for courses.
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For serious landscapes, the D800 over the D700 every time. It is one of the (maybe few) genres where the very high resolution will be a decided benefit and the relatively poor (in today's terms) performance at ultra-high ISO is not an issue. (In fact, ISO for ISO, the D800 may well outperform the D700 but we will have to wait for more detailed testing). Nor is the lack of a very high frame rate an issue for landscapes.

As you will have noted in the Technical Guide, your best landscapes are going to be taken using a tripod and with an aperture not much smaller than f/11.

The lens you mention might be a good compromise for starters. The Nikkor lenses I use for landscapes are (in order of frequency of use), the 24-70mm f/2.8, the 70-200mm f/2.8 and the 16-35mm f/4. I have just sold my D3s and placed an order for a D800, which seems right as most of my photography tends to be landscape and wildlife. But it would not have been the right move if I was heavily into sport and event photography. Horses for courses.

Thanks, and I agree with you. The reason I thought about 24-120 f4 is that it would make a good alround lens to start with. It's just that if I went for the D800 I think I would also need to buy a new computer, the size of the raw files don't bare thinking about. ;)

Thanks, and I agree with you. The reason I thought about 24-120 f4 is that it would make a good alround lens to start with. It's just that if I went for the D800 I think I would also need to buy a new computer, the size of the raw files don't bare thinking about.

You might find that the size of the Raw files is not, in itself, such a problem. It really depends what you are asking your computer to do with them.
When I was shooting MF film on the RB67 and scanning the 6x7 colour negatives at 2400ppi I was getting Tiff files of around 700Mb (ten times the size of a D800 Raw) and Lightroom had no problem processing those on the computer I was using at the time, which only had 4Gb of Ram and a 2.8GHz dual core processor.

You might find that the size of the Raw files is not, in itself, such a problem. It really depends what you are asking your computer to do with them.

When I was shooting MF film on the RB67 and scanning the 6x7 colour negatives at 2400ppi I was getting Tiff files of around 700Mb (ten times the size of a D800 Raw) and Lightroom had no problem processing those on the computer I was using at the time, which only had 4Gb of Ram and a 2.8GHz dual core processor.